Auto Insurance and Internet. (MetLife and Comcast). @#!!#***

My auto insurance falls due next month.

1. I am (according to my driver's licence) a Florida "Safe Driver".

2.  I have not made a claim in years.

3. My car is nine years old, going on ten.

Despite this my premium for 2015/16 is more than $100 more than it was for 2014/15.

I checked this with my insurance agent A.A.A.  (American Automobile Association).  Their clerk called MetLife (my insurance company).  She was informed that this increase is because "there is a general increase in insurance rates)

 More about this below at ***

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So, being smart, I went on-line to get a quotation from one of the Auto Insurance Companies which assure us, via their T.V. ads. that "this company will save you money".

( For U.S.A. readers, it was not the company which uses an animated Gecko to peddle its' wares. It was the one which, (let the American reader understand), whose name will remind you of the era of President Theodore Roosevelt).

So I submitted my request for a quotation, using the same insurance requirements which I presently have.

At first I was delighted.  The quotation was for just over half of what I currently pay.

Whoop-de-doo until I read the fine print.    This "bargain" quotation was for six months only, not for a year.

This stinks!.  How can I trust a company promising  savings;  which at first blush seem to be attractive; but which fails the truth test when the potential customer reads the fine print?

It all feels like a shell game, or a con game.

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Conservatives in the U.K. and the U.S.A. are for ever extolling the virtues and benefits of the free market.

I ask "is there such a thing?".   Or is the mythical and magical market weighted and biased against the ordinary and average consumer?

 FOR EXAMPLE


***  How and why is it that MetLife can decide upon a "general increase in insurance rates", without a word of explanation to its customers as to why this is necessary?

I ask the same question about my internet service provider COMCAST, (a monopoly where I live), which every year "ups" its  monthly charge, sans any improvement in service, or any explanation of why the increase is necessary.

My guess is that MetLife and Comcast are companies which are more devoted to profits than they are to customer service.

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